First of the Losers
by Massani
Summary: It had to be some sort of mistake. Second. She had come in second.


**Written for the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition  
** **Position:** Beater 2 for Holyhead Harpies **  
** **Prompts:  
** Write about a light character committing the sin of PRIDE  
6\. (dialogue) "Have I told you that I hate you recently?"  
12\. (setting) the owlery  
 **Word Count:** 1026

* * *

Hermione couldn't quite believe what she was seeing. It had to be some sort of mistake.

Second. She had come in second. As if that wasn't bad enough she had to get beaten by him. It was unthinkable, this wasn't some nonacademic subject that caters to half-wits or something relying on physical prowess. It was Charms! She was great at charms, how on earth could she come anywhere less than first? The whole notion was absurd, there had to be an error somewhere; a missed mark, adding up wrong, anything!

"Hey look, I beat Hermione," Ron grinned smugly at her. "I can only imagine what's running through your head right now."  
Hermione resisted the urge to hit him.  
"Congratulations Ron. You must have worked really hard for it." She wondered if her congratulations came across as genuine. It was hard to make anything sound genuine through clenched teeth.  
"What? Nah, I just sort of turned up and put down some random stuff. I'm surprised I got anything right at all." Ron laughed and turned away. "I'll talk to you later, I have to go send a letter."  
Hermione stared after him and imagined how he'd look as a monkey. Probably not much different than he did now.

* * *

"Oh hey," Hermione said as she walked in the owlery. "Fancy seeing you here."  
Ron paused from attaching a letter to Pyg and looked at her, a puzzled look etched into his features.  
"I told you I was going to be here. Like, literally 10 minutes ago. We were outside charms?"  
"Oh yeah, I guess you did," Hermione dismissed. "Seeing as how you brought it up I was just wondering how you managed to do so well on that test?"  
A huge smile broke out on Ron's face.

"Oh, I get it."  
"What?"  
"Wow. It must really bother you to get beaten, huh?"  
"What? No. Don't be silly." Hermione laughed nervously. "It doesn't matter to me how you got the grades. I just thought that you might want to gloat about it or something?"  
"Really?"  
"Yeah, go ahead and gloat."  
"If you insist…I'm honestly amazed I got top of the class—especially beating you. For such a perfectionist it must get under your skin that I beat you. Is that second place haunting you? Can feel the mediocrity just building under-"  
"Stop!"

"Hah! I knew it!"  
She wanted to slap that smile off of his stupid, freckled face. Or throw him off the owlery. She couldn't believe she'd risen to his taunts. What was wrong with her today?  
"Ok fine! I don't like losing to people!" She shouted "How did you do it? Did you use a cheat sheet?"  
"No."  
"An auto-answer quill?"  
"No!"  
"Bribe Professor Flitwick?"  
"No! I didn't do any of that!"  
"Ugh!" Hermione grabbed her hair in frustration. "You're so annoying! Have I told you that I hate you recently?"  
"About four times a day." Ron retorted. "Why can't you just accept that I got this honestly?"  
"Because you're stupid!"

Ron froze and raised his eyebrows at her.  
"Excuse me?"  
"No… Look… That's not what I meant. I—"  
"No no. You said I'm stupid. What makes you think that?"  
"I don't. It all came out wrong. I only meant—"  
"Hermione, what did you mean?" She backed away slowly as Ron advanced towards her. "Am I an idiot? A simpleton? Am I too stupid to use scissors unsupervised? What did you mean!?"  
"You're not an idiot okay!?" she shouted. "I only meant that I'm smarter than you!"  
Ron threw his hands up in disbelief. "That's the same thing!"  
"No! It's completely different!"  
"How?"  
"I work really hard all the time to be the best while you and Harry are off galavanting! When you go off to play quidditch; I study. When you practice dueling by the lake; I study. When you hide Neville's frog, you guessed it! I study! All I do is work to be the best and then you come along with no revision and beat me! It's not fair!"

During her outburst, Ron had started looking less angry and more understanding. Now she'd finished he looked at her with new eyes.  
"I didn't realise you felt that way."  
Hermione realised she had started crying. She wiped the tears from her eyes and looked up at him.  
"Yeah well, it's hard sometimes. Being smart"  
Ron nodded and smiled softly at her.  
"I get that. It's hard being stupid sometimes, though."  
"You're not stupid, Ron."  
"Oh, you've changed your tune" He laughed. She tried to smile along but only ended up starting to cry again. She turned away from, she couldn't handle the pitying looks he was giving her. All of a sudden she felt arms wrap around her as Ron hugged her. His long limbs might make him look a bit gangly and awkward but they made for good hugs.

"I think I might die of embarrassment." She said, "Do you mind letting me go so I can jump off this tower?"  
"No."Ron squeezed her tighter and she smiled despite herself.  
"Ron, as nice as this is I can't breathe"  
"Oh right yeah." Ron let go of her and took a step back. "Are you feeling okay?"  
"Not really," she admitted "But I'll be alright. I just hate to lose."  
"Well, look at this way you were the best loser. So you were still kind of first."  
Hermione just looked at him.  
"Did that not help?" She shook her head and looked at him again. Ron walked over and hugged her again.  
"Don't worry. You'll be back to beating me in no time at all."

Hermione tried to nod but her face was pressed into his tried to speak but it just came out as unintelligible murmurings.  
"What was that?" Ron released her slightly and looked down at her.  
"I just wanted to say thank you."  
Ron tilted his head and smiled.  
"Anytime."


End file.
